A Lion Or a Snake?
by FanfictionWriter8
Summary: Everyone is still shocked at Rhian's betrayal. Agatha is in hiding, invisible on the Igraine, and Sophie is forced to play the part of his queen... or get sliced open with Excalibur. No one can tell who is the Lion and who is the Snake anymore. This time their new fairytale will truly end - the question is, how? With the Lion or the Snake? Set after Quests for Glory.
1. Chapter 1

Sophie watched Agatha flee from Camelot Castle, swallowing a scream. She wanted to call out to her friend, tell her to run faster, as cheers of _"KING RHIAN!"_ enveloped her in shock. And she could feel the cold press Excalibur's tip, right on her spine.

Camelot's new king placed the crown on his head, gold and diamonds reflecting the blinding morning sun, shattering it into a thousand rays of light. Guards and pirates sprinted away, desperate to catch Tedros's princess before she disappeared, but, to Sophie's relief, Agatha disappeared into the distance, safe, at least, for now.

Rhian smiled at her, but he didn't lift the sword from her back. "I said I'd make you feel like a queen, remember?"

Sophie didn't answer, as a cold, empty sensation filled her heart, where it had once beat for a dashing knight of Camelot. She looked up into his eyes, and she couldn't see that Rhian anymore. All she could see was a Snake.

Rhian studied her carefully, eyes hardening. "I love you, Sophie. And you will be my _queen_. Isn't this what you want? To rule Camelot, side-by-side?" his eyes drifted to her diamond ring, the ring Sophie could feel weigh on her finger as if it weighed 10 kilograms. "King Rhian and Queen Sophie. Our _Never After_."

She winced, hearing that phrase for the first time in six months. Memories of her cruelty in desperation for a crown flooded through her head, making Sophie shudder. She'd escaped an Evil School Master and now she had been tricked into dating a Snake. _So much for True Love,_ she thought. But then she remembered Tedros and Agatha. Tedros, who was locked his own dungeon, in his own kingdom… Agatha, who was fleeing from her broken Ever After…

Rhian let her go, guessing how she felt now. "Take her to her rooms," he told tattooed Thiago and sunburnt Wesley. Sophie made a mental note not to ignore Dot again.

Sophie locked eyes with him as the pirates tugged her away, mouthing the words _, "I trusted you."_

She saw Rhian flinch, Excalibur in hand, mouth open. Then he turned away with a kingly smile, bowing to the cheers of the gathered Sons of the Lion and members of the Lion's Army.

She looked back towards the horizon, praying that her best friend was okay.


	2. Chapter 2

Agatha could smell Sophie's Lavender Mist eau de toilette. She sat on the huge, soft bed in the Captain's quarters, still half-full of Sophie's beauty potions and creams, which she hadn't finished moving out.

Tears slid down her face, without Agatha realising. She was almost numb to her surroundings. The _Igraine_ flew, invisible, into Camelot's clouds, with no set course but away from the betrayal.

She thought Rhian was Tedros's loyal knight. She'd _ordered_ him to kill the false Snake. _She_ was meant to be the best judge of character… of _true_ Good… but she'd missed all of the clues until it was too late, like everyone else had.

Now the Lion was the Snake. _He had pulled Excalibur._

Agatha could still hear echoes of the cheers she'd heard as she's fled, from what was meant to be her and Tedros's kingdom, _their_ Ever After … _"KING RHIAN! KING RHIAN!"_

The _Igraine_ whirled through the sky, over the Four Point. Agatha could still feel the cold pulse of shock, the tears, the rising fear. Tedros was locked in his own dungeon, in _his_ kingdom, awaiting execution. Nicola, Hort, Beatrix, Reena, Merlin, Guinevere… all of them were in danger. And Agatha could sense pirates unfolding a map of the Woods, discussing places she could be heading towards. And Agatha didn't know where she was going, either. She didn't know what she was going to do.

Taking a deep breath, Agatha stood and ascended to the _Igraine_ 's deck, unable to inhale Sophie's perfume anymore… Sophie, who had a sword to her back… Sophie, who was getting _married_ to a _Snake_ …

She stood still, gazing out into the distance as the ship soared over Jaunt Jolie. She told herself that she'd fix it, she'd work it out, that everything would be alright, trying to believe it. But she couldn't. It felt a lot like all was lost.

This fairytale scared her more than hers and Sophie's had. It scared her because she'd felt more powerless… in the Tale of Sophie and Agatha, she'd _known_ what to do – kill the School Master, keep Sophie alive. But in this new tale, Merlin couldn't help her. Dovey couldn't either. And she had no idea how to _really_ kill the Snake. It seemed like she'd lost her Ever After for good now. She had no way to reclaim it, to seal The End. No way to win.

Agatha slipped back down to Sophie's cabin. She dove under the smooth, silky duvet, and tried to sleep through exhaustion and terror and shock, heart beating hard, as she wiped away tears.

Closing her eyes, Agatha made one last wish. She thought of Camelot and prayed that her friends were okay. That _Tedros_ was okay.


	3. Chapter 3

The pirates jeered as they marched them through the castle in brand-new guard uniforms, pushing Merlin and Dovey along and nearly dragging Tedros, who was still in shock.

"I trusted _Rhian,"_ Tedros whispered, as they unlocked the dungeon with Lady Gremlaine's keys, washing the coal-black stone prison in a faint glow of morning sunrise. "He… he was my knight-"

"Except he wasn't, so shut up, So-Called Lion," one of the pirates hissed as his mates laughed.

The crew of the _Igraine_ were pushed into one big cell with benches on the wall. Locking the barred door and placing bets on how much more gold they would get from the king, ignoring Hester and Anadil's witch-coven insults very well, the pirates ascended the stone steps of the dungeon again and slammed the ebony door behind them with a final bought of jeering laughter.

"Well, well, well," three voices rose out of the dim light. Tedros recognised them at once.

"Those are the advisors," he muttered to their crew.

"What have we here?" Bethna cackled.

"Betrayed little son," giggled Omeida.

"Who didn't listen to us," finished Alpha. All three burst into howls.

Hester and Anadil raised eyebrows.

"We sort of like them," Anadil said, eyeing Hester.

"They're like us," Hester said, eyeing Anadil.

Both turned with a glare to Dot, who moaned. "Here it comes."

"We'd be just as good as them if the third member of our coven wasn't an Ever-loving, chocolate-eating _beaver_." They hissed in unison.

Dot rolled her eyes and turned a rock into chocolate, before scarfing it down.

"If only the little So-Called Lion had heeded our warning," Alpha said.

"If only he'd listened to his not-princess," said Bethna.

"May be no beauty, but she's nearly as smart as that handsome, grey-eyed knight," Omeida added.

Guinevere whirled to her son. "They're _this awful?"_

"Turned out we were right, weren't we?" Bethna mused.

"We're quite good at guessing," Omeida grinned.

"Took a while for dear Once and Future king to see that," Alpha sneered.

" _Least_ he realized," Omeida said.

"Must be so disappointed in _both_ of his sons," Bethna sniggered.

Tedros glared at them, but his fury towards them was overpowered by his shock and fear. He still couldn't control his thoughts… organized them… face them…

 _Rhian. Snake. Agatha. Camelot. Woods. Betrayed. Execution. Dad._

They flared through his head, a flurry of words, a whirlwind of cold shock and terror and… and the _cheers…_ those cheers…

" _KING RHIAN! KING RHIAN!"_

It was meant to be his and Agatha's kingdom… their Ever After… Agatha, who he'd pushed away… he couldn't think about it anymore. He couldn't think about Rhian and the gift and the fact that he was locked in his own dungeon. Tedros forced his attention back to the Mistral Sisters.

"… and now all of Camelot's gold has _disappeared_ because of you!" Guinevere was raging. "This Snake! Rhian! You _knew_! And what did you do? Let people _die_! _My True Love is dead_! My _son_ _is nearly dead!_ And the Mistral Sisters sit around and _laugh!"_

"Guinevere," Professor Dovey cut in crisply. "I'm not sure now is the time to voice your hatred towards the advisors."

"The traitor-queen certainly seems to think so," Alpha smirked.

Guinevere's cheeks burned red. Her anger ballooned up, about to inflate-

"Wonder how the snakey-Lion will feel when his plan fails," Omeida said, enjoying their gapes of shock. Guinevere deflated, face white.

" _Fails?"_ Hort said, eye wide. "The Snake is _going to fail_?"

"I don't think we should tell them," Alpha purred.

"Remember the last time we gave one of our _unique_ prophesies?" Bethna agreed.

Beatrix hissed. The Evergirl stood and walked up to the side of their cell that barred with the Mistral Sisters'. "Listen," she growled, "my kingdom, Jaunt Jolie _is invested with pirates!_ I've failed my _quest_! So I don't have _time_ for crackpot witches who won't say anything that makes _sense_!"

She turned to see her classmates staring at her, jaws dropped.

"Here I thought she was a princess," Hester wisped.

"I learnt a lot from Agatha," Beatrix smiled, before turning back to the advisors, who were doubling over with shrieks of laughter.

"Oh, wasn't that priceless?" Omeida grinned. "A pretty girl like me with a little bit of spunk. How _fun_."

"The difference is that you're twenty years older," Alpha joked.

"Doesn't lessen my radiance," Omeida shot back.

"Are you going to tell us or not?" Reena glared, standing up next to her friend and crossing her arms.

"Ooh, can't deny them the heart attack, surely?" Bethna sniggered.

"Now we know why you hate them," Nicola murmured.

Tedros straightened. Whatever it was, and whatever it was going to cost, he had a feeling that it was _valuable._ That he _needed_ to hear it. Besides, it was a welcome distraction from worrying about Agatha or Camelot or both.

"Should we make it rhyme?" Alpha muttered.

Tedros had had enough. He stood up and glared. "Just. Tell. Us."

The Mistral Sisters giggled and stood up in a semi-circle, eyes half-closed.

"The sword will again return to the stone," said Omeida.

"And all of the efforts will be for none," said Alpha.

"The 'Lion' took a crown but is it meant to be his?" said Bethna.

"Only time will tell and it will end with a kiss," said Omeida.

"A new, deadlier story that ensnares the whole Woods," said Alpha.

"But soon the real Lion will stand as he should," said Bethna.

"The legendary king will set a new trial," said Omeida.

"For both of his sons to face a king's tests and guile," said Alpha.

"Which son does king Arthur truly want to rule?" said Bethna.

"To protect Camelot from a prophesized duel," all three finished in unison.

Before any of them could respond to the new, mysterious, shocking information, they heard glass shattering.

All of them, advisors included, stared up at one of the three tiny, square, stained glass windows in Camelot dungeon, which now had a cat-shaped hole.

With a hiss, Reaper sat up and shook out his fur, but this wasn't what made them all clutch their chests in surprise.

Reaper had _wings._

Dark, feathery, huge shrivelled wings.

Glaring at Tedros with supressed annoyance, most certainly resenting him for hurting Agatha, the winged cat scratched out a barely-readable message on the stone floor with sharp claws.

 _I CAN FIND AGATHA. I CAN SEND A MESSAGE TO HER._

Tedros nodded. He wanted to talk to Agatha more than anything. He wanted to apologize. But he didn't know what to say.

Hissing again, Reaper thrust out a torn piece of parchment.

Tedros wrote, not knowing if the words were good enough. But he _needed_ to say them. As he finished, he hesitated.

"I… I want to give her something," he said, looking up. "But I don't know… I don't have anything."

Guinevere laid a hand on her son's shoulder. She reached into a deep, hidden pocket of her gown, and pulled out a ring.

It was made of gold Tedros recognised. It glinted exactly the same way Excalibur's hilt did. It glowed with a single gem that glittered a thousand colours, from gold to green to violet.

"It was your father's," Guinevere said softly. "It was my engagement ring. I never got to give it back to him, and then, when I met Agatha, I decided to give it to you to give it to her. I was going to present it to you specially, a week before your wedding. But with everything that's happened…"

She trailed off, placing the ring in Tedros's hand.

Without hesitation, Tedros carefully folded it into his note and handed it to Reaper.

"Don't let the ring fall out," he told the balding-shrivelling cat he had once hated.

With a final hiss, Reaper spread out his wings and dove through the Reaper-shaped hole. Tedros watched him leave, heart in throat.

Even the Mistral Sisters were silent.


	4. Chapter 4

Sophie woke to the smell of roses. Again.

The same scent of the rose that her 'Lion' had given to her. He'd thrown his True Love a rose, a rose for their own unique Ever After. Or so she'd thought.

But it was all a Lie. _More_ a Lie than what Sophie had thought she'd had with Rafal or Tedros.

Sophie inhaled sharply, wincing at the thought of how things had been only a day ago. Agatha and Tedros, king and queen, her best friends, at her side, her prince who loved her for who she really was holding her, as she, Dean Sophie, completed her quest and proved herself worthy of Lady Lesso's successor. Just _a day_ ago.

Sophie sat up, desperately determined to find a distraction, any at all from the whirlwind of horror inside. She had been dragged, by those _awful pirates_ , to the queen's quarters. Agatha's quarters. Sophie had refused, but she was kicked in the bottom and thrown onto the bed, as Thiago and Wesley laughed jeeringly.

* * *

"Don't know why the king even likes this prissy, stupid Dean," Thiagoo muttered, as he tossed a key lazily to the other side of the room.

"Has a _weakness_ for pretty girls, like all the best," Wesley sniggered. "Even _Rafal_."

"Can't understand them, myself. Lovesick for _this."_

With a few last howls, the pirates left her to her terror, anger and guilt.

* * *

Sophie winced again as she surveyed her surroundings for the umpteenth time. _Agatha should be staying here,_ she thought, thinking of her best friend, Agatha, kind, Good, sarcastic Agatha. Who was a thousand times a queen than Sophie would be even if she tried her hardest.

But now she was meant to marry a 'king' she doubted, no longer trusted and who she'd discovered was a mass murderer of Good _and_ Evil.

Sophie closed her eyes and fell back onto Agatha's bed. And she let herself cry.

She let the sobs rack through her body, let the tears fall onto the slightly dusty duvet. She hadn't cried for years. Not _really_ cried. Not like this. Not since she thought she'd been abandoned by Agatha, when Evelyn Sader's tricks stripped her of all the good emotions in her, emptied her of her will to live. That was the last time she'd felt so vulnerable and shocked and confused. The last time she'd felt as if every single thing in the world was wrong.

And now it was.

Sophie had said _yes._ To the _Snake's proposal._ She'd thought she was saying yes to her True Love, to a Lion. But now, like before, she'd been tricked into a "happy ending" that she never wanted in the first place, one that didn't feel happy at all.

She wiped a hand across her soaked cheeks and blinked at Agatha's chambers. The cracked walls, half broken chandelier that looked like it was going to collapse at any moment now, the neglection, the idea that this was _Camelot._ Agatha had been right.

" _Royal from afar, rotten when you look closer."_

" _I'll fix it better than Tedros did,"_ Sophie had heard Rhian say to the Wood's jubilant leaders. _"I'll do a king's jobs. I am King Arthur's son. I will make Camelot, and, in doing so, the Woods, great again."_

Would he, though? Rhian had wanted to be king of Camelot, but she had a feeling that it wasn't to turn it towards Good again – he'd proven that he wasn't _Good_ in any way at all. It would be more likely that he'd do something else…

Yet he didn't have any more respect for Evil than he did for Good. That was why, she realised, he'd frowned when she'd talked about being Dean and restoring Evil's balance in the Woods, so that it was again Good's equal.

So what would Rhian do to Camelot?

* * *

Ignoring the key on the floor, other than a quick look of disdain, Sophie left the rooms, unable to think in them anymore, hurrying down the first flight of stairs she found.

She'd wrestled open the closet, to find it still filled with Agatha's colourful Camelot gowns. Her throat caught. Then, with a deep breath, Sophie took one of the few black, Agatha-like gowns she could find and closed the wardrobe, telling herself that Agatha wouldn't mind anyway, which she probably wouldn't. But while it was painful, Sophie wanted to have a part of her friend with her as she faced Rhian.

The dress, surprisingly, was tight and had a formfitting waist, and a billowing skirt with a slight train. Not surprisingly, it had a non-revealing halter-top neck, small, off-shoulder sleeves and a black cumberband. But it still had a touch of Agatha, and Sophie held back more tears as she inhaled Agatha's unique and slightly heavy scent.

She hurried down continuously, having no idea where she was going, but knowing what her objective was.

Luckily, she happened to wander to the person she was hoping, and scared to, to find.

Rhian was talking to the priest Agatha, the _Royal Rot_ and the _Camelot Courier_ had pointed out to be the presider at Tedros's coronation.

"Rhian," she said simply, stopping half a metre away from him and the priest, who gave her a fleeting, furtive, empathetic look.

Rhian looked up. A half-smile lifted his lips, _Snake_ lips, lips that Sophie somehow, despite everything that had happened, wanted to kiss. Mentally cursing herself, she thought about the people who had died… who Rhian had carelessly and with no conscience, killed…

It worked.

Sophie mustered up her best dazzling "Ever" smile, then after a split second, her best, most cutting, sharpest and Never glare. But she couldn't hold it. After one second, her face collapsed again into her blank, tired, storm-filled eye expression with a wince.

"What is it, Sophie?" Rhian said, eyeing Agatha's dress. "Have you run out of gowns? I'll send for more to be made – you already look like a beautiful, true queen, but wearing a beautiful dress does help." He grinned, and Sophie knew that he knew that it was Agatha's dress.

Sophie looked in dead in the eye and said, "I am wearing a queen's dress, from a queen's wardrobe."

Rhian gaped at her, with the same expression he'd let flash across his face when she'd told him how she didn't trust him anymore. Then his face hardened, and he turned away.

"So you still refuse to preside over _my_ coronation, the coronation of Camelot's _real_ king?" he shot at the priest, who quickly dropped his expression of admiration and approval of Sophie's defiance.

" _Real_ king? I do not thinks so," the priest replied, glaring back. "Camelot's 'real' king, butcher the Woods for his own means? Camelot's 'real' king, preparing to execute his only half-brother? Camelot's 'real' king act so horrifying that even the most cold-blooded Evil feared him? Camelot's 'real' king, do all the thing you did? No, that doesn't sound like any King of Camelot to me."

Rhian hissed, so softly and so dangerously and so 'Snake', both Sophie _and_ the priest recoiled.

" _I am the true heir and eldest son of King Arthur._ Excalibur left the stone for me! I am King Rhian!"

He unsheathed Excalibur swiftly and ferociously, waving it in front of the priest's face. _"I_ am the next One True King!"

"Really? In other people's opinion, or in your wildest daydream?" The priest, whom Sophie decided was the first old person she respected, said coldly.

"In other people's opinion," Rhian said. "Ask the whole Woods, who is a better king, me or Tedros? What will they say, I wonder? The Lion's Army and the Sons of the Lion? _Me."_

"I will not crown a false king, in Camelot or anywhere else," the priest replied, examining his clipped, unusually short nails.

"I am not a false king," Rhian forced out, trying very hard to seem calm, but Sophie and the priest could clearly see his vein throbbing, as if a red light was flashing. "I am King Rhian of Camelot."

"It is against all my beliefs, values and traditions of Camelot and the world to do any such thing. I will not crown a Snake."

Rhian snapped. His eyes blazed, face overturned with rage, anger churning out as if the tightly sealed container had broke and the burning liquid was flowing out, his gaze so searing Sophie half-expected the priest's old fashioned, seemingly tailored burgundy robes to set aflame.

" _I AM THE LION! I AM THE KING! I AM NOT A SNAKE!"_ he roared, and everyone in the vicinity turned and gaped. Most were citizens of Camelot, who were on Tedros's side and looked at him with the look they would give a squashed, wriggling, hateful cockroach.

The leaders of the Woods, however, who insisted on staying at Camelot at least until the coronation and probably until the wedding (which still made Sophie feel the worst kind of nauseous), stared over with wide eyes and wide mouths, before gaining composure and rushing to Rhian's defence.

"He _is_ the Lion!" the King of Bloodbrook roared.

"He saved all of our lives!" shrieked the Queen of Jaunt Jolie.

"He's a hero!" cried the Duchess of Glass Mountain.

"Long live King Rhian of Camelot!" yelled the Queen of Ravensbow.

"Who are you to call our saviour a Snake, barmy old codger?" the King of Mahadeva shouted at the top of his lungs.

Rhian's eyes locked with hers, and an odd, contorted, distorted version of hurt flashed across his face as he watched her stand there and press her lips together, saying nothing. He had expected her to do the same, to be his queen even though he planned to kill her best friend and her best friend's fiancé, even though he had killed her classmate.

Sophie stood there, eyes still locked to his, with an expressionless, or, at least, stony, face and closed mouth.

"I doubt his Majesty King Arthur would approve of a son like you," added the priest, for good measure.

He turned back to the priest, whose posture wavered with fear, but whose eyes stayed determined and loyal. The castle fell silent, with kinetic patience, waiting to see what would happen.

"You either show your hidden loyalty for me and our Camelot now or be exiled from this kingdom forever," Rhian said slowly in a low, clear, crisp, deadly voice.

The priest's eyes widened, but he stayed firm and cool, even as Rhian waved Thiago and Wesley over.

"Say goodbye to Camelot," sneered Thiago, as Rhian gave a nod. They dragged the priest away, and he was now as much imprisoned as Sophie was.

Rhian swiftly kissed her cheek, supposedly consolingly, and walked away with cold, high-headed 'kingly' grace.

Everyone turned back to what they were doing.

Rhian walked back to her after one moment. "What was it you wanted to talk to be about, Sophie? Anything, my queen."

Sophie stood frozen, gazing into his eyes, blood nowhere in her body, limbs ice-cold. He watched her expectantly with his piercing eyes.

"Nothing," she managed to choke out in a whisper. And she turned and ran.


End file.
